Who won and who lost today’s film news?

The Newsies is a regular feature that sees The Dissolve cheerfully adding to the awards glut by handing out imaginary awards related to the day’s movie news.

How? Of The Day: James Franco is doing another movie James Franco has signed on to direct and produce William Gay’s The Long Home, “a coming-of-age story set in rural Tennessee in the 1940s.” The story, based on Gay’s James A. Michener Memorial Prize-winning novel, “centers on a young and headstrong Tennessee carpenter who lost his father years before to a human evil and is forced to make difficult moral choices to face up to that evil.” I don’t know what most of that means—a human evil? a carpenter?—but I do know that James Franco is making hella movies and must be some kind of immortal ghoul who never sleeps.

Already In Line For This Of The Day: John Legend and Miguel’s movie John Legend’s Get Lifted Film Co. (which I did not know was a thing, but am now pretty happy about) is partnering with Furst Films and IM Global to produce an as-yet-untitled musical romantic drama that will maybe star Miguel. This could be terrible, a la Glitter, or it could be great, a la Beyond The Lights; either way, I will see it. I am already buying tickets for it. I don’t care that there are not even real tickets yet. I will draw them on MS Paint and print them out for myself. The movie will mark the feature directorial debut of video/commerical helmer Nabil Elderkin, and “will be told mostly with music and follow a former one-hit wonder who regains his love for music when he is hired to coach an aspiring singer for her audition on a singing competition show.” It’s important to add that, in my eyes, John Legend and Miguel can do no wrong, even if they do actual wrong, like make a shitty movie.

Suspicious Injury Of The Day: Daniel Craig and his knee on Spectre Last week we speculated (correctly) that Johnny Depp’s mysterious off-set hand injury that took him away from filming Pirates Of The Carribbean was caused by a punch in the hand as administered by Jesus. Today, it’s like, again, Jesus? It seems our fair, previously invincible Daniel Craig has also been knocked about by Christ. This weekend, he underwent knee surgery to repair an injury caused while filming “a fight scene” (with the Lord) for Spectre. A rep for Eon Productions described the operation as “minor,” just your casual, run-of-the-mill Easter knee surgery that will not affect the filming of a multi-million-dollar project. But it does raise the question: Who’s the next older-dude victim of this (un)holy crime spree? Pierce? Russell? Liam?

Why? Of The Day: THX has updated its “The Audience Is Listening” fanfare You know that terrifyingly loud noise that sometimes plays before movies, accompanied by the words “The Audience Is Listening”? It is officially called the “THX ‘The Audience Is Listening’ ‘Deep Note’ fanfare”; I just call it a cab, because get out of here, you’re scary!! Deadline is reporting that after 30 years, THX has put a fresh spin on its original audio-visual (click the link to watch/listen). The new version is even darker and more baleful, its bleak, crescendoing wail even more likely to strike fear into the hearts of young children and render anyone above the age of 14 immediately deaf. Also, now, instead of reading “the audience is listening,” the copy reads “see you on the other side,” which is either a thinly veiled death threat or an ominous reminder of your own mortality. Either way, it’s rude.

Indie Drama Title Of The Day: The Wolf Who Cried Boy Barkhad Abdi, of “I’m the captain now” fame, has joined the cast of indie drama The Wolf Who Cried Boy. That is certainly the indie-est title of all time; congrats to it. Described as an “anti-coming-of-age story” (it cancels out James Franco’s The Long Home), it centers on a “teenager who gets swept into the seedy underbelly of the scrapping industry in the rusty carcass of a once-thriving metropolis [and then doesn’t come of age, ever, because fuck coming of age].” Abdi will play Reggie, a limo driver “who acts as a fence for stolen copper.”

It’s Not March Madness, But It’s Not Not March Madness Of The Day: Filmspotting Madness My understanding of March Madness borders on nonexistent, primarily because sports make me want to run screaming into the abyss and I cannot pay attention to anybody long enough to have them explain it to me, so bear with me on this one. Filmspotting is doing its own March Madness-y thing, Filmspotting Madness, “a fun variation on March Madness that started with 32 actors and actresses (that the show is fond of).” I’ll let them explain it further because, again, I don’t know. “We’ve pitted them head to head and we're down to the Final Four [Michael Fassbender versus Joaquin Phoenix and Jessica Chastain versus Bill Murray]. The championship match will be set when the polls close at 8 pm Central tonight.” So, go over there and vote! Have a drink! Make friends! Or don’t. Just don’t say I don’t tell you about fun things.